iRobot Roomba e5 vs. i7+ — Differences Explained

If you’re looking for the best that the iRobot line of smart vacuums has to offer, the Roomba i7+ is the best around. It’s incredibly expensive, but it includes a self-cleaning dust bin base that can empty the dustbin from the vacuum on its own, and you can also use it up to 30 times before it needs to be emptied. Imagine only having to worry about dealing with your vacuum once a month!

The main benefits of the Roomba i7+ are the fact that it can remember your home’s floor plan and empty itself between runs. The Roomba e5 has a few less features, but it’s much less affordable which makes it a competitive offering for those of us who are buying on a budget. It won’t keep up with the awesome features of the 7+, but it’s still jam packed with perks such as the smart app and voice control.

Is the i7+ worth the extra cash? We certainly think so, but you should read on below for a detailed comparison of the Roomba e5 vs. Roomba i7+ in order to figure out which is best for your own needs. Feel free to jump right in, or head to a specific section that interests you using the navigation bar below.

iRobot Roomba e5 vs. i7+ — Differences

Difference #1: Automatic Dirt Disposal – Perhaps the most notable difference between the e5 and the i7+ is the support for automatic dirt disposal. Your Roomba will pick up a good amount of dust and debris during its scheduled cleanings, and all that junk needs to be emptied pretty regularly. The e5 requires you to keep an eye on the bin and empty after every run or two, which can definitely make the robot feel a little less convenient. The i7+, on the other hand, can auto-empty its bin into a hopper attached to the charging station.

Once your i7+ is finished cleaning, it will navigate to the Clean Base Automatic Dirt Disposal in order to dump its contents, and the container attached to the station can hold up to 30 bins worth of debris! You really should only have to empty the hopper around once a month, which makes it near-effortless to enjoy beautiful, clean floors without any thought whatsoever.

The main difference between the i7 and the i7+ is that the i7+ comes with the Automatic Dirt Disposal base included. If you’d like to save a little money, you can always opt for the i7 and upgrade to the new base later on when you feel like it’s worth the investment.

Difference #2: Imprint™ Smart Mapping – Another feature that makes the i7+ feel truly smart is its support for Imprint Smart Mapping. This specific Roomba is the only model that is capable of being scheduled to clean specific rooms by name. Using the smart mapping feature, your Roomba will learn your home and remember each individual rooms, so you have complete control over which rooms are cleaned and when.

It’s the perfect time to take advantage of your Google Assistant or Amazon Alexa voice control and tell your Roomba to spend some time cleaning the bedroom!

The e5, unfortunately, has no such feature.

Difference #3: Clean Map™ Reports – Both the e5 and i7+ do a very good job of keeping your floors clean overall, but sometimes it’s nice to get some statistics over just how well the vacuum is actually performing. With the i7+, you’ll have access to Clean Map reports which give you a sense of where your robot vacuum has already cleaned, as well as useful information like the coverage and duration of each completed job.

The Clean Map Reports are the perfect complement to the smart mapping mentioned above, since you can tell where your Roomba might have passed over and direct it to spend a little more time where some extra cleaning is needed.

Difference #4: Cleaning Preferences – When it comes to customizability, you just really can’t do much better than the i7+. The Cleaning Preferences feature gives you a huge amount of control over the way your Roomba cleans. You can control nearly everything, with the ability to adjust various power settings, the number of cleaning passes, the final edge clean, and so much more.

For the control freaks who really want to tweak their Roomba to perfection, it’s clear that the more premium model has the edge over the e5. The cheaper vacuum does a great job with its default settings, but something having that extra degree of control can really lead to the perfect clean.

Difference #5: Battery Life – One thing to keep in mind when considering these two vacuums is that they have a pretty significant difference in their maximum runtimes. The e5 is actually capable of vacuuming for longer on a single charge, with up to 90 minutes of power versus the i7+’s 75 minutes.

One thing to keep in mind, however, is that the i7+ can resume cleaning after charging while the e5 can’t – but more on that below.

All things said, while taking the battery lifes at face value, it’s clear that the e5 can be out and about cleaning for longer without heading back to the dock.

Difference #6: Air Power – While all these smart features are certainly useful, the fact remains that your Roomba is a vacuum first and foremost. As such, the amount of power and suction it can harness to clean your floors is an important consideration.

The e5 delivers 5x suction while the i7+ delivers 10x suction, suggesting that the latter is a much more powerful vacuum.

It’s certainly true that the i7+ comes out ahead in terms of pick-up performance, as it’s difficult to deny the effects that significantly more suction can have on cleaning prowess. For the majority of situations, your e5 should be more than sufficient. For that deep, trapped dirt or stubborn pet hair, however, the extra suction on the more premium model will certainly come in handy.

Difference #7: Entire Level Cleaning – Last but certainly not least is the idea of entire level cleaning. Your e5 lasts longer on a single charge than its more expensive competitor, and it will head back to the charging station automatically when it runs out of juice. However, one of the biggest downsides to the e5 and many other less expensive Roombas is that they aren’t able to pick the schedule back up when they have sufficient power.

The i7+ features entire level cleaning, which means your whole floor will be cleaned – no matter how many recharges it takes. It can certainly be frustrating to come home and find that your Roomba ran out of charge halfway through a vacuum, so this is one area where the i7+ has a pretty significant advantage.

The best part of a Roomba vacuum is not having to worry about looking after your floors, and this feature is a large reason why the i7+ does a better job of that.

iRobot Roomba e5 vs. i7+ — Things in Common

iRobot Home App – Both the e5 and the i7+ hook up to WiFi and as such can be controlled through the iRobot HOME app. This app has a bunch of useful features and an intuitive interface that makes it easy to issue commands and adjust the schedule of your Roomba, but one of the biggest perks is the ability to control your vacuum from wherever you happen to be. Come home from a night on the town to a vacuumed home simply by starting a manual clean from a WiFi hotspot. It’s truly a feature that is far more convenient than it seems at first glance.

iAdapt® Navigation – Part of what makes the e5 and i7+ vacuums so excellent is their iAdapt Navigation system. This is a large part of the reason why they’re so “smart,” as it takes advantage of a full suite of sensors to guide your Roomba around the room. iAdapt will help your vacuum expertly navigate under and around furniture, and cliff detect will even prevent your robot from falling down the stairs – perfect for letting your robot clean the bedrooms!

3-Stage Cleaning System – Another large perk that is common to both vacuums is the 3-stage cleaning system. There are multiple pieces of equipment at work under the hood, and they all combine in order to tackle dust and debris head on and leave your floors looking immaculate.

The 3-stage cleaning system uses dual multi-surface brushes and a specially designed edge-sweeping brush to pick up dust on the floor and in hard-to-reach corners, and brings it into the path of the powerful suction that will pick up most any debris.

While all three of these parts combine to produce a top-notch clean, the dual multi-surface brushes do a lot of the work. One brush will loosen and agitate the dirt while the other moves in the opposite direction to extract it and pull it into the vacuum. All of the brushes are designed with rubber treads that will allow your Roomba to remain constant contact with the floor – even when transitioning between different surfaces like carpet and hardwoods. The brushes are able to adjust dynamically to pick up anything in their path, ranging from small particles like dust and dirt, to clumps of pet hair and big pieces of debris.

All in all, it’s a cleaning system that iRobot has perfected over the years that they’ve been producing these smart cleaners, and it’s quite apparent in both of these models that the company has the tech down pat.

No More Pet Hair – Families with pets are probably going to make use of the vacuum the most, as our furry little friends have a tendency to shed. You’ll be glad to hear that both the Roomba e5 and i7+ are designed to pick up more pet hair than other models, all while resisting tangles from pet hair.

The rubber brushes don’t tangle nearly as much as a traditional brush, and they work in tandem with power-lifting suction in order to suck in any clumps of pet hair and keep them contained within the unit. Speaking of which, both models also feature a high-efficiency filter that captures 99% of cat and dog allergens, so you shouldn’t have to worry about the vacuum kicking hair up into the air.

Self-Charging – One of the best parts of having an e5 or an i7+ is just how easy they are to handle. Your Roomba will keep an eye on its charge throughout its current cleaning cycle, and if it starts to get very low it will navigate back towards its docking station to top itself off. With these newer models, you shouldn’t ever have to worry about finding your Roomba in some corner with a dead battery, since the intelligent navigation and battery-detection capabilities ensure that it’s back to its dock with plenty of time to spare.

Virtual Wall Barrier – Another feature that most Roombas have in common is support for a virtual wall barrier. Using a small node you can place down in an entryway or around a specific object, it’s easy to keep your vacuum out of areas that you want left alone. Messy areas with a lot of obstacles or rooms with fragile objects might not be the best place for a Roomba, so it’s nice to be able to use an invisible barrier to keep your e5 or i7+ on track.

Voice Control – Last but not least, the Roomba e5 and i7+ are capable of receiving commands through Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant. Want your floors vacuumed but don’t have your phone handy? Just tell your Amazon Echo or Google Assistant to start, stop, or dock your robot and watch the magic happen!

iRobot Roomba e5 vs. i7+ — Accessories

There are several accessories that you might want to purchase alongside your new Roomba to make daily use or ongoing maintenance a little bit more convenient.

For both models, we recommend purchasing the Dual Mode Virtual Wall Barrier to keep more rooms blocked off. If you’d like to give your Roomba free rein of the house these are probably unnecessary, but you may find that granting your vacuum access to certain rooms causes more problems than it solves. They are intelligent little devices, but there’s always the risk that they’ll get caught on something or knock something over.

Filtration is really important in every vacuum to ensure you don’t end up with a ton of dust kicked up into the air. Your stock filters will last quite some time, but having Filters for Roomba e and i Series on hand will help make the replacement process a little bit more convenient when it comes time to swap them out.

For an all-in one approach to maintenance, you can make things easy with the Cleaning Replenishment Kit for the Roomba e and i Series. Included within are three High-Efficiency Filters, three Edge-Sweeping brushes and one set of replacement Multi-Surface Rubber Brushes. This should give you all you need to keep your robot friend in tip-top-shape for the years to come.

Last but not least, it’s worth mentioning the iRobot Clean Base Automatic Dirt Disposal base for the Roomba i7. If you buy the i7+, it comes included in the package. For those who opt to save some money buying the vacuum individually, however, you may soon find yourself wanting to upgrade!

iRobot Roomba e5 vs. i7+ — Our Thoughts

All in all, it’s sort of difficult to declare these two robots on a level playing field. The truth is, the iRobot Roomba i7+ is a superior vacuum in pretty much every sense of the word, and we recommend it as one of the best options available on the market.

With that said, you really have to consider the costs of the vacuum when making a decision. The i7+ has a ton of convenient features and can pretty much take care of itself, sure, but is it really worth that much? If you really hate ongoing maintenance and want your floors cleaned with as little hassle as possible, it probably is. For those of us who are willing to deal with changing the bin every now and then, however, the Roomba e5 represents a completely viable and much more affordable choice.

Our Score:

iRobot Roomba e5

iRobot Roomba i7+

4.6

Let us know what you think!

Have you noticed other differences between iRobot Roomba e5 vs. i7+? Feel free to add them or share your experience with the products in the comments section below. Your input can help other people make the right choice!

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